ON ASSIGNMENT IN MEXICO
"We were there to put the
sounds and tastes and textures
of Mexico onto the page," says
PRIIT VESILIND about our team
of six journalists, including
CHARLES KRAUSE, Latin Amer
ica correspondent for PBS's
News Hour with Jim Lehrer.
This past March they fanned out
across the country in search of
the real Mexico, supplying the
latest firsthand information to
writer Michael Parfit.
Priit found Rosa Martinez
Lopes, an enterprising teenage
weaver
who
sells handicrafts
PRIIT VESILIND; BY JESlJS L6PEZ
for her village of Zinacantin.
Writer ANN WILLIAMS and inter
preter LILIA RUBIO shared a tra
ditional Sunday family picnic
in Mexico City's Chapultepec
Park. In Michoacin a Tarascan
woman taught writer CASSAN
DRA FRANKLIN-BARBAJOSA all
she needed to know about
crushing dried insects to make
red dye. Former staffers SANDRA
DIBBLE, now with the San Die
go Union-Tribune,and PAUL
SALOPEK, from the Chicago
CHARLESKRAUSE;BY TOMASZTOMASZEWSKI
LILIA RUBIO (LEFT) AND ANNWILLIAMS;BY JESIS L6PEZ
PAULSALOPEK;BY JESUS L6PEZ
Tribune-both fluent in Span
ish-also contributed to this
special issue. Paul traveled to
the Sierra Madre mountains of
Chihuahua to interview Tara
humara Indians; Sandra hit the
streets of Tijuana-where she
lives-to find harmony with
Jorge Vargas, one of the town's
singing policemen. "He speaks
very nice English," she says of
the lieutenant, "that he learned
from watching cartoons as a
little kid."
The real Mexico? Our people
found it in her people.
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